Pages

Thursday, October 05, 2006

NanoWrimo's next month...

...and I'm preparing to participate for the second year. I'm nervous. Somehow, I was able to write a book last year during the scariest year of my life. We had just come back to Lake Charles after evacuating because of Hurricane Rita. We had a semester to salvage. We had students and teachers (waving a hand - like me) who were psychologically damaged who had homes that were damaged. Yet, somehow, I found the time to write, to complete a 60,000-word novel. A friend of mine, a professor at the uni, suggested that in the midst of chaos, my writing became the way I could organize my little part of the world. I think she's right. I was very regimented. I came home every day and wrote 2,000 words. If I missed a day, for whatever reason, I wrote 4,000 words the next day. There were a few days I wrote 8,000+ words in a day. I knew that if I were going to write when I arrived home from work, I had to make use of my time at school. During office hours, if students didn't show up, I graded, prepped my lectures, filled out my roll book, made phone calls. When I arrived home, my siblings (my 2 bros and my sis live with me - we've formed our own cool-ass fratersorority - BRO PHI SIS) would leave me alone for two to three hours, and I wrote. Afterward, I hung out with my sibs, checked e-mail, prepared for the next day. I did for this 30 days straight and was rewarded with a novel that wasn't half-bad.

And now, I gear up to do this again. Though, thank God, we have not witnessed another hurricane this year (knocking on wood), I am dealing with other "big" things, like my best friend moving away to New York and two of my close friends leaving, and me often finding myself without someone cool to talk to about writing and all its lovely angst. I'm hoping I can keep my focus for 30 full days. To help with that, I'm trying to loosely outline the book I plan to work on to give me some structure. Today, I got a few chapters outlined and jotted down other ideas that may happen in future chapters.

Hopefully come December 1, I will have another book under my belt! You'll hear all about the journey here when November 1 hits!

An aside...be on the lookout for a new interview on another great woman writer! :-)

Powerful Woman Writer Award

Facebook Badge

Member of She Writes

Member of Book Blogs

Writing about Writing

Over at my site CLG Entertainment [editorial services, coaching services, etc.), you can find links and content to many of my articles I've written over the years on the writing craft. Definitely check them out! If there's something you'd like me to write about, e-mail me and let me know. Click the image below to head to CLG-E.